Tag Archives: visa

Portfolio Performance for 2016: underperformed, but businesses doing well

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Performance of my portfolio for 2016 was only 7.4%, underperforming S&P which made 9.54%. 

On 12-31-16 the relative proportions of holdings were

 

MSFT 49.9%

V 22.7%

SBUX 15.2%

CNI 5.59%

ADBE 4.98%

Cash 1.43%

 

No stock trades were made this year.

Beginning with Q2 2016 dividends were credited to cash instead of reinvested, to build a reserve for future purchase of stocks when they should reach an attractive low price. 

The performance of my stocks in the market was as follows:

 

MSFT    +14.65%

V           +1.36%

SBUX     -6.1%

CNI        +22.67%

ADBE    +9.59%

 

Possible causes of the relatively low performance are as follows. 

In the market volatility in September 2015 and January 2016, the S&P fell 10% from its peak of 2126 on July 17 2015 to 1921 on September 4, 2015, before climbing again to a peak of 2099 in November 6, then falling 12% to 1864 on February 12, 2016.  Unfortunately, I had no cash ready to invest in order to take advantage of the attractive low prices which appeared during the dip.  That is one reason that my performance was lower than it should be.  To address this, as mentioned above I began setting aside dividends to build a cash balance to fund acquisitions at attractive prices, whenever these should appear.

Another reason was that SBUX and VISA had suboptimal years in performance, although not as businesses.  SBUX missed revenue expectations for the first threequarters of 2016, then beat in Q4.  It beat earnings in Q1, met in-line in Q2 and 3, and barely beat in Q4.  The stock price more of less followed these results.

During 2016 Starbucks began developing its strategy of “premiumization” of the Starbucks experience, with the Roastery flagships stores and the Reserve category of Starbucks stores.  The various initiatives to expand the Channel Development segment continued.  The Full year 2016 revenue rose 11% and non-GAAP EPS 17% yoy, so hardly a poor showing.  The trailing PE is currently about 30, which is approximately average for recent 10 years. The continued evolution of SBUX to strengthen its competitive advantage and adapt to new markets is intact.

VISA acquired VISA Europe on June 21, 2016, for €12.2 billion ($13.9 billion) and €5.3 billion ($6.1 billion) in preferred stock, convertible to VISA Class A stock, with an additional €1.0 billion, plus 4% compound annual interest, to be paid on June 21, 2019.  To pay for this, VISA in December 2015 issued $16 billion of senior notes with maturities ranging between two and 30 years. The acquisition was expected to be dilutive to earnings in 2016 in the low single digit range. 

Stock dilution is being offset as the $16B debt issuance is being used partly to increase stock buy backs.  The acquisition should be accretive in low single digits in 2017 excluding integration costs, and accretive in high single digit range by 2020.  The increased earnings are partly from increased efficiency:  increased scale, cost cutting efficiencies realized by integration of the businesses, and benefits related to Visa Europe’s transition from a member-owned association to a for-profit enterprise. VISA Inc. will be positioned to take on the estimated 37%, or USD $3.3 trillion, of personal cash and check spending in Europe. Europe has been an early adopter of mobile payments using NFC, expected to grow.  Visa Inc. has aggressively launched new mobile payment partnerships, platforms and products that will enable faster growth and adoption of mobile payments in Europe. This includes new tokenization services, support for digital wallets and wearables, strategic investments in other enabling technologies, ecommerce (such as VISA Checkout) and P2P payment capabilities, as well as the opening of several global innovation centers. 

VISA will be able to present a seamless experience and global capabilities to its European and international clients.  Hence the evolution of VISA Inc. to strengthen its competitive advantage as digital payments global market leader, and adapt to serve evolving markets, is intact.

 

VISA Q1 2017 Earnings, harvesting market growth, ploughing and sowing for the future

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2-4-2017.  VISA Q1 2017 (2-2-2017) earnings call was led by Alfred Kelly Jr., who became CEO, replacing Charlie Scharf on 12-1-2016.  Al Kelly graduated from Catholic, Christian Brothers affiliated Iona College, in Westchester, NY, with undergraduate and MBA degrees. He worked in the Reagan White House as manager of information systems (using DOS, or Windows 2.0?) from 1985 to 1987, then held a range of important roles at American Express for the next 23 years.  He has been on the VISA Board of Directors since 2014 and therefore played a role in approving the current strategy. 

In the earnings call, Kelly noted that VISA strategy will remain as is, in a seamless transition with the previous CEO. He noted VISA has a talented leadership team; strong relationships with issuers clients, acquirer clients and merchant clients. It is important to learn about and address their business needs while reducing friction in and enabling digital payments. VISA is in an industry with strong growth. In developing markets, middle classes and governments are demanding payment digitization. In developed markets, ecommerce and mobile payments are displacing checks and cash. VISA is a leader in payments technology and constantly supports innovation in ecommerce and novel forms of payment digitization.

I will address the overall strategy of VISA, which describes how VISA fills a key criterion of an Eternal Company investment: the ability to extend its competitive advance into evolving new markets, in a separate post.

Following is a summary of Q1 2017 financial results.  Rev and EPS exceeded expectations as accelerating business more than offset exchange rate shifts.  GAAP Q1 rev up 25%, EPS 7%. Adjusting for the non cash gain in Q1 2016 from writing off the VISA Europe put, adjusted EPS up 23%.  Payment volume growth increased 1-2 % in most geo regions. Cross border payment growth accelerated 2% from 10-12% globally excluding VISA Europe. Including VISA Europe impact, they accelerated 10%.  Process transaction growth accelerated 15 from 12-13% driven by India and US.

Did not issue 2$ Billion in debt as panned to finance VISA Europe acquisition as well as other costs. VISA has 8$ Billion offshore, will await Trump plan for corporate tax reform which may well allow cash efficient cash repatriation. Until then, used commercial paper issuance to fund stock buyback and operating cash needs.

The only region with reduction in growth was Latin America, due to Brazil. 

The integration of VISA Europe is proceeding and will continue throughout 2017. Europe represents meaningful growth opportunities, with large opportunities to displace cash.  Plan to advance digital payments by rolling out tokenization, VISA Checkout, and supporting digital wallets.   VISA continued to focus on local market priorities alongside client engagement. The vast majority of VISA payments volume in Europe remain under contract and is therefore protected in the short term.

The deliberate process of consultation of VISA Europe staff was completed later than expected. New hiring, investment to integrate technology with that of the international VISA system are adding expenses as planned.   As cost reductions are realized and Europe clients access global VISA capabilities,  earnings will accrete and value will be realized for shareholders, as planned since the takeover was announced.  Equity dilution related to the purchase is being offset by accelerated share buybacks. 

In India, Aggressive demonetization measures pushed by the government resulted in doubled transaction volumes but little revenue growth. Responsive to request by the Indian Government, VISA charged no fees for processing through 12-31-2016.  VISA regards this as an opportunity to expand the network and acceptance internationally, focusing on building customer awareness and merchant acceptance 

Kelly articulated “So.. when you consider the economics of the investment we will make in India, plus conservative pricing, it will not drive much profit this year. But this is a great year to make sure we do everything we can in one of the two largest population countries in the world to get as good a position as we can to help us over the next decade. “

I would like to make two observations on this lovely sentence.

1. It prioritizes strengthening the company competitive advance for the long term over short  term profits

2. the nature of the VISA business supports long term investments such as the one mentioned because of its competitive advantage.  The VISA services introduced into the developing India market will still be indispensable in 10 y.  As long as VISA continues to support successful innovations in payments, while nurturing and strengthening its network security and reach, it will undoubtedly maintain its relevance and dominance in the market.